Monday, April 30, 2012

A time lapse photo shots of our recent bakawali. I have to thank you Izyan, Sadon, Saiful, Salim, Jaja and Nizam. They took turns to look after the whole video and photo sessions, and viewed for themselves the rare bakawali blooming and smelled for themselves the extravagant fragrance. Erina from Putrajaya who happened to be here popped in to see a part of the process.

I remembered about a blogger friend who asked for 4 bunga bakawali as traditional treatment for her sick brother. Kakdah will dry the flower , and will soon get 3 more for her.

But the whole flowering process is unique, opening just for the night....

Thursday, April 26, 2012

1. There is quite a variety of vegetable beds at the back of the house. Six identical rows of narrow rectangular beds are the focal points placed a few steps from the back door. Two wide rectangular beds at the far back and two square vegetables beds more or less complete our gardening focal areas. Honestly with the current work schedule, I cant possibly look after them that well. So some vegetables are overgrown, too many weeds and some empty ones had been empty for too long.

2. When we had to be away at weekends, then gardening is terribly affected, since weekends offer the most valuable time for garden overhaul, but for square vegetable bed with 11 ubi kemili plants, light mulch of dead leaves put weeds in control.

Square Vegetable Bed with 11 ubi kemili plants

ubi kemili plant close-up

Ubi Kemili or Ubi Keling

3. I have to admit, I had not mastered the technique of growing this particular plant. In Kelantan last year, ubi kemili or ubi keling plants grew beautifully, but ended with no tubers. I will work out something to make sure there would buckets of tubers from the eleven plants.

the flower

4. Squeezed between hibiscus island and the wide rectangular vegetable bed, are flowering plants. Two periwinkles and a few clusters of zinnia. It wasn't as tall as zinnias we grew in Putrajaya many years back, or may be these are the dwarf type. But the colours are really mixed, white, red, pink and yellow....

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Bunga bakawali is mysterious, it will start blooming slowly as daylight thins down and by midnight it is ready to close down slowly, and by the next morning it will limp. We had three bloomings, the first one was last early year 12.1.2011(click here:Bunga Bakawali Blooming, the stages.). The second time was in Kelantan sometime in July last year but we had to be outstation so by the time we came back, it was all over. The third was this year in January, again we we had to be away when it bloomed. It looks like we would be lucky with this bunga bakawali.

Nizam has agreed to set up time lapse photo shots, two cameras for front and side view. I think the show time is going to be tomorrow......to see the mysterious flower blooming and smell the most intoxicating extravagant fragrance on earth.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Finally our own tomato ended in a nice juicy noodle. The satisfaction is a lot more than a similar noodle with tomato bought from the market. There is a lot more to gardening than just just germinating, planting and harvesting, and if I can share here, gardening is like a classroom teaching about emotions, strategies, problem solving, handling success, coping with failure, thankfulness, multi-tasking, short term and long term planning, social engagements and more and more.

The second harvest of tomato wasn't great with 5 sizeable tomatoes. Two ended in noodle soup, one for me and one for kakdah. It was the best noodle on earth ever!

Tomato second harvest

Tomato second harvest

The best noodle soup on earth!

It was special, as we ate slowly taking our sweet time, taking twice the length of time we used to finish a bowl of noodle. How we play around with the tomato in the mouth, pushing it to one side and another, refusing to swallow, describing the taste and remembering the journey that particular tomato had to take.

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Malaysia is blessed with many types of fruits. Some are seasonal, like durians, some are all the year round like nangka and jambu. The skin could be unsightly, but the inside is beautiful, and most has symmetrical arrangement. Most tropical fruits are exquisite in taste.